Thaksin not interested in reconciliation process

Bangkok (AP) — Former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, ousted by the military coup in 2006 and still the object of political passions, declared Friday he doesn’t want to be included in a reconciliation process being promoted by the current government.

Thaksin said he doesn’t seek anyone’s help by including him in the process, and instead wants an end to persecution of him and his family. Thaksin expressed his thoughts in a Facebook posting, his first extensive political commentary in many months.

Thailand’s former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. (AP Photo)

“For the reconciliation process that is soon to happen — I ask that for every side to leave me out of the equation entirely. I do not want anyone to recommend anything that would help me,” Thaksin wrote. “‘In turn, the people in power should not use miracles and any way possible solely to try to get rid of me with taking into consideration the rule of law.”

The government has been promoting a reconciliation process for the declared purpose of patching up political differences.

Thaksin’s remarks came just days after authorities initiated a legal process to collect 17.6 billion baht ($503 million) in taxes they say he owes for his sale in 2006 of shares worth 73.3 billion baht ($1.88 billion) in his telecommunications company to a Singapore state holding company. His lawyers say the taxes were not applicable under the law in effect at that time, and that the Revenue Department’s efforts are politically motivated.

In 2010, the Supreme Court ordered $1.4 billion of his assets seized for concealing his ownership of the family telecommunication group and tailoring government policies for his own financial gain.

Various legal attacks have also been made on his sister Yingluck, and a ruling that as prime minister she had been negligent in administering a rice subsidy program led to her being issued a $1.3 billion fine, a ruling she is challenging.

Another political ally, Yingluck’s foreign minister, Surapong Tovichakchaikul, was banned from politics for five years on Thursday on the basis that he acted illegally by restoring Thaksin’s Thai passport that had been invalidated after he went into exile.